Exploring Parque Juan Carlos 1

After a failed attempt to reach Parque Juan Carlos 1 by bicycle, I decided to finally take the metro. It's just a couple stops before the airport in Madrid and is a large sculpture park built in the 90's. I could see this strange series of sculptures on a hill and from a distance they looked like buildings. 

Now, in my Valencia post I complained a lot about the disregard of context. But I have to say, that in this park, it is so large that defies the context of the area around it if there ever was any. It is far out, near the airport, near a large modern business complex hosting a large building for congress and many corporate headquarters. On some of the other sides there is residential that is relatively new as well. So the area may have been planned together. But it made me wonder about the handling of context when you are designing in the middle of nowhere with little context to draw from? 

The park plan is a large circle of water with large hills, monumental sculptures, and grids of trees. Its geometry creates an internal logic that, while a little strange, is very strong and consistent. And it was very purposeful the way that the columnar trees and vertical elements reflected in the waters surfaces (below)

There was also a lot of careful consideration to the horticulture. The park was divided into zones of planting types. Above shows a more tropical zone. It was much more lush and varied than other Madrid parks I have seen.

Some of the sculptures were interesting and playful

I especially loved this landscape sculpture covered in fake turf! I saw some kids riding BMX bikes on it so I assumed it was a play structure. But when you get close you can see it has a moat around it with signs to keep off. It was meant only as sculpture, but it does cry out for interaction!

Towards the end of my tour I came upon two large green hills. Most of the park is not irrigated so the lush grass really made the land forms stand out. They were very large hills so I am not sure if they were part of a landfill or just made to create vistas. One hill has a grove of mature olive trees on the top shown above. The other has a metal dome and 4 cypress trees. I spent some time on top of the hill looking out at the park thinking about context. And like most things, I decided that "it depends". There are times for connection and there are times for standing apart, and times when parks create the logic for the areas around them. Juan Carlos 1 may be a strange park but it does successfully create its own little world!

Anillo Verde Ciclista: Part 2

I honor of the Vuelta 2012, I set off today on another journey down the Anillo Verde Cicista! This time I headed east and then north counterclockwise around the loop riding through Madrid Rio Park and through Parque de Manzanaras.

Parque de Manzanaras: My trusty rental steed with basket of course

Parque de Manzanaras: Most of the main walkways and spaces in the park are paved in wood which is something we wouldn't even think of in the Northeast US because of the rot and maintenance but here the arid climate of Madrid wood lasts for a very long time. But it would have been very expensive because there is not a large natural supply of wood like we have at  home. 

 The wood and grass amphitheater is very dramatic. But it is not part of any natural landform. There are two other large hills on the site which I can only assume are former landfills. The amphitheater may have been built to buffer the park from the nearby expressway.
                                                                                                                                                                   

South of the city the river is not channelized and looks much more natural 

Photinia Maze! This could be great for all my southern landscape friends. They grow quickly so you wouldn't have to wait too long to get a functioning maze. Of course I'm not thrilled about the way the flowers smell but in a large park it wouldn't be intrusive and the red new growth looks dramatic.



Then heading further on the Loop it got to be a bit less picturesque. Many parts were along service roads and there was even a tunnel with a narrow pedestrian crossing to navigate

 So far this section of the loop is extremely exposed. Definitely bring extra sunblock and water because once you get outside of Madrid Rio Park there is nowhere to stop to get more. 

 The tunnel connection looked a little dodgy but was rideable.

Throughout the system there are these "rest stops" Most of them have benches, bike racks, and signage. The stops on this end of the route were very exposed, poorly maintained and had no signs. There looked like there was a water fountain at one time but it wasn't working. There was really no point in "resting" at any of these stops. The signage in general in this leg of the route was horrible. It was impossible to tell where to turn sometimes. The western leg I covered in an earlier post was not great but there were standard signs at most critical points. There may be some guerrilla signage actions in my future:)

A pretty rundown skate park along the Parque Lineal de Palomeras near the M-40 expressway

This video is along Parque Lineal de Palomeras. I was grateful to finally get some shade! 

But as a warning it is a very long steeper grade here, so be ready! It's a lot more fun on the way home. I saw some old men playing bocce ball (its called Petanque here in Spain more related to the french version of the game). The park wasn't that great but had some interesting landforms as a buffer from the M-40.

This was about where I think I lost the trail. After this pedestrian bridge I spent about 45 minutes riding around with another lost couple from Barcelona trying to get back on the trail to Juan Carlos I Park. But we ended up circling back to Parque Lineal de Palomeras. It was getting late so I just decided to call it a day. But this just emphasizes the real problem with signage on the route. I will go back to this point next time and try to figure out  where I went wrong. I've been told the historic gardens at El Capricho are really nice and that Juan Carlos I is interesting so it will be worth another try (or I could take the metro but what fun is that!)

On the way back to the bike rental place I ran into a pre-celebration for the Vuelta! There were tons of cyclists, families, and kids with numbers on their bikes having a blast. There was music and stationary bike races too.







People were really having fun with it. I loved these girls dressed in the scene from ET!













So hopefully I'll post again soon with guerrilla bike signage updates!

Non-Contextual Monuments to Architecture: Calatrava's City of Arts and Sciences

So I have just returned from a 3 day trip to Valencia and I hate to be a hater but here I go anyway... I am appalled at the lack of holistic vision for the city of Valencia! They have invested billions of euros in schemes that were poorly planned and are not creating returns for the city. 

#1 Offender: Calatrava's City of Arts and Sciences

Now, I've always admired Calatrava's work, the purity of their white forms inspired by nature, the soaring bridges... he created so many wonderful icons for cities around the world. But when it came to his home town of Valencia, he went too far. The arts and science complex represents everything wrong with the rampant Spanish spending that created their current economic crisis. Just looking at the complex, it looks like they wrote the architect a blank check and said, "go nuts!". They could have created a powerful monument with just a couple of buildings, but the white futuristic complex seems to go on forever. And besides the gross expenditure of over a billion euros, it is completely non-contextual. Because it was created in the river bed of the Turia River that was moved due to flooding, it was literally a tabla rasa. It does not connect to the urban fabric around it at all or reference anything about Valencia. The only bits that relate are the symbolic use of water (Valencia is on the sea) and the Guadi-esque tile work that is a signature of the region. But honestly I think he just wanted to use water because it makes a nice reflection of the eye-shaped building! There were also no people there! Granted it was in the last two weeks of August when the whole country goes on vacation even in the tourist areas. But we could not get into most of the buildings and it was just a huge empty space. I hope that there is more programming during the rest of the year.

#2 America's Cup 2007
The city invested in massive infrastructure to host America's Cup in 2007 which has sat abandoned since the end of the event.

America's Cup Building by David Chipperfield. unsure of current use.












So the city, again invested heavily in a scheme to host this famous sailing regatta and reorganize the port area. And from what I can see from visiting is that this area is currently not accessible to the public and completely blocks the waterfront. The only way besides bus to reach Valencia's famous beaches is to walk along the abandoned row of regatta buildings near the port in the scorching sun! There is little sidewalk space or planting, you just walk by row after row of shoddily built regatta structures that were obviously put up in haste with cheap materials. 

#3 Turia Gardens
The Turia river had always flooded wildly which is why the original walled city of Valencia was not built closer to the sea. But after a serious recent flood, the river was moved to a channel south of the city leaving the river bed open. In place of the river, they built a park. 

In general this is great. It creates a green corridor across the whole north side of the city. The challenge of this was because it was a river, the whole area was sunken below street level to protect from floods. So already there was a series of historic bridges crossing the area. It is lushly planted with tropical trees and has walking and bike paths throughout. Just the fact that it is there is good for the city. But the design could be much better and well maintained. And it might be because I walked from the bus station to my hotel along the entire length of the park in the heat with my rolling suitcase, but it seemed extremely monotonous.

So what is the problem? I mean, this should be great; there is a new linear park across the whole city, a reorganized port, and a new arts and science complex as a cultural icon like Bilbao. But what is missing, clearly was a LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT considering the whole integration and intention of the masterplan! This could have been an amazing thing for the city, but instead it is a series of isolated budget blowing projects (excluding the park I think) that do not connect the urban fabric at all! What a loss, truly for the city of Valencia because the center city is charming and worthy of a visit all on its own. 

The lovely sandstone churches and feathery leaved trees hint at its seaside location and warmer climate. And the beaches, while not Spain's best, have soft sand, warm Mediterranean water, and with the new high speed train are the closest to the capital of Madrid. If only they had spent some of the billions of euros on an integrated masterplan that generated increased tourism, made the waterfront more accessible, while also being contextual and creating a better urban environment overall instead of creating a Disney style series of monuments only to be reached by tourist bus!

Just another sad example of opportunity lost and non-contextual, non-integrated planning. 
Rant complete:) Please comment if you feel I have missed something or if there is some history to the planning of these areas that would shed some light on their condition.

Columbia St Bikeway Art Finally Complete!

Delayed satisfaction is a fact of life for most landscape architects. You may work on a project for years and then it takes years to get built. And the with the speed at which designers change firms, many people often do not get to see projects through to the end. But I was lucky during my six years at Mathews Nielsen Landscape Architects to see many projects from design to completion.

But there were a few dangling projects at my departure that I have watched with anticipation. Columbia St. Bikeway was one of those projects. The bikeway itself, the first 1/4 mile of the Brooklyn Greenway, had been completed years ago. It was a standard bikeway in many respects but its adjacent streetscape was designed to emphasize the speed and rhythm of cycling with the addition of a salvaged cobble band  (uncovered during adjacent sewer reconstruction) patterned with bright pink granite. The brightness of the pink was hotly contested, but once it was installed and covered in a layer of grime, it would have had to have been neon pink to really stand out as intended. The trees were alternating groups with yellow flowers or yellow spring leaves to provide continuity as well as diversity. Care was taken to provide larger soil area in this harsh environment. Structural soil and continuous tree pits were used throughout.

newly installed salvaged cobbles and cut pink granite. the texture difference is more noticeable than the color.

But the dangling project in question was the Percent for Art component where 1% of the budget is put towards public art. The artist Nobuho Nagasawa was chosen by the community and I worked closely with her throughout the project to integrate her artwork into the larger streetscape. This included a lot of meetings and multiple presentations to the Design Commission. Nobuho had many interesting ideas for the streetscape but settled in the end on one of her first and clearest ideas; she wanted to trace the shadows of native New York trees that we would hand-pick for the streetscape and etch them in bluestone. So when the tree was large there would be a memory of when the tree was small. Nobohu got to know the community very well and carefully chose locations that were significant.

The design, now called TIMECAST, was finally approved by the Design Commission and won an award in 2007. But the installation timing was tricky. To be truly authentic, the traces were to be made in situ, so the streetscape and trees needed to be installed before the artwork could be created. So we had to add asphalt patches in the streetscape that could be easily removed once the artwork was complete. And of course there were mishaps. Con-Ed boxes and fire hydrants getting installed in art locations, etc. But I left to go to Harvard in 2009 and did not get to see the artwork installed. It was not until this past Spring 2012 that they were finally finished. I was here in Spain when I got the email from the artist telling me that it was complete!

I'm very happy to see that this white swamp oak is doing so well! It was a beautiful tree when we selected it at the nursery

One sad street tree died before its artwork could be installed so this one truly is a memorial.

I was really excited to see that other people are enjoying the artwork. Photographer Tom Rupolo did a very nice series of detailed photographs of the etchings. He kindly gave me permission to post.

 Many thanks to Joe Sopiak from DDC and Susan Chin, Victoria, and Xenia from DCA that made the long process and number of meetings bearable. I really had a great time working with all of them. And many thanks to Signe Nielsen and Nobohu Nagasawa for their unwavering dedication to the project throughout its 8 year duration!

For more information see the following links
http://www.brooklyngreenway.org/columbia-watefront-public-art-dedication-timecast-by-nobuho-nagasawa/
http://blog.archpaper.com/wordpress/archives/39487
dedication video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wp6ta263i8I

Anillo Verde Ciclista Bike Loop, Madrid

The Anillo Verde Ciclista is a 65km (40 miles) bike loop completely circumnavigating Madrid, roughly following the M-40 expressway. It cost approximately 33.4 million Euros which also included bridge crossings and plantings along the bikeway. This is my summer journey to see it all!

 Here is an interactive map if you'd like to follow along.

This is the map of the entire route shown in orange. I started on the west side at a bike shop called Rio Bikes near the Principe Pio metro stop. They have an amazing rental deal; if you buy 10 hours of time in advance its only 3 Euros per hour (regular 4, and other shops are 5 Euros). I was also able to get a basket so I didnt have to carry my bag:)

This is just the summer challange I need! I am not strong enough to cycle the whole route right now but little by little I'll ride sections of it and eventually I'll do the whole route in one day! I've taken some short rides south along the Madrid Rio Park and south along the Manzanares River, so today I decided to try going north on the Ciclista. I entered through Casa de Campo. Near the lake I found an information center where I was able to get a good map of the entire route. The beginning part of the route was on paved roads shared with cars but once I got on the official route north of the park it was bikes only on a seperated route.  

On the left is the first section still within Casa de Campo. Its a beautiful ride lined with a London Plane allee.

I hadnt even gotten out of the park yet when I saw this amazing play structure. Of course, I had to stop and try it out! It was all really thick rope with rubber seats at intervals. The color and structure just blended right in with the trees. It didn't distract at all from the picturesque old pine grove.

As you leave the park you ride along the river heading north. It was lush and shaded (nice in this hot summer weather). The river is wild at this point and not controlled by dams like it is along the park. It was shallow and clear and I could see big fish just hanging out. I also saw some nice floodplain areas and even some Phragmites (hello old friend!). 


Then there were a few bridge crossings over highway. I am sure a lot of the budget went to these various structures. But this is what it takes to reconnect a city with a lot of highway infrastructure. In most cases the highways are not going to go away so there has to be a commitment to building bridges and tunnels to reconnect the urban fabric! 

There was this interesting older bridge that was integrated into the route. I assume it was an old car bridge but was made obsolete by larger highways and off ramps. It was cobbled and had these great statue gate keepers.

...and from there it got a lot less picturesque. The route got more narrow and directly paralelled the highway for awhile. Luckily the bikeway was a lot higher than the expressway so was separated by elevation and a fence covered with blooming honeysuckle. I think this distracted nicely from the car smell.

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This was a nice moment in this part of the route with an allee of poplars. I headed north toward El Pardo, a large natural area. But then the route became very stark, hot and dry. I kept hoping for some relief around the corner but there was nothing. I was also getting tired so I decided to turn around and leave El Pardo for another day when I have built up more stamina.

The route back seemed to fly by, I think because I was more familiar with it. Hopefully as I explore I will know the best places along the way so I know when to push through a less desirable section to get to something good around the bend!

My total today was about 16km!

My trusty steed (above)
But even though some parts aren't the most beautiful I think its amazing that they were able to piece this route tegether in an existing city fabric.  Also I got a sneak peak at the new city General Plan that will be released next month and it includes more cycling routes within the center city that will connect like spokes to the Anillo Verde Ciclista to create a more comprehensive network. Sounds like Madrid will just keep getting better!

Tactics - Chair Bombing +

Here is a small survey of some of the tactics listed in Tactical Urbanism that were new to me. 

I had heard of yarn bombing, but not chair bombing! I am so sad I am missing all this fun in NYC! So people are removing wood pallets from the waste stream and using them to build chairs to put in public areas.

Do Tank originated chair bombing but it has now been replicated in several cities, including Philadelphia, Dallas, and Mt. Reiner, MD. Chairbombing has been recognized in the New York Times as a method of Tactical Urbanism. They also hosted a BYO at the BQE post Park(ing) day celebration that looks amazing.

This also reminds me of what my friend Anne Trumble has been doing with her group, Emerging Terrain in Omaha. Their "trugs" are activating a local streetscape.

And the Stored Potential project is a tactic to change people's perceptions about the city and the particular neighborhood where the grain elevators are located.

Stored Potential

I mean this is all pretty obvious maybe, but for me, looking at all of these interventions together, it's such a positive thing. Ten years ago I never would have believed the things that are happening in NY now with bike lanes and Times Square. We have hit a critical mass of urban actions and with the Internet, a good idea can go viral overnight. I really admire all of the people out there making things happen in our cities:)

Sugar Beach Eye Candy

I just can't help but repost some photos from Claud Cormier's Sugar Beach in Toronto! It sounds silly, but the candy pink umbrellas just make it pop. And the rock candy stone is amazing. If anyone knows how they made this, please post. The landforms, the fountain lit pink... I always thought his work was too pop art before I saw him speak at the GSD. But hearing all the interesting thought behind the work really made me appreciate it!

Some Sugar Beach eye candy for you!
see full project at http://www.claudecormier.com/project/sugar-beach